Pettitte: Yankees are coming alive

We've been on a roll the last few weeks. Considering the way we started the season, it's good to see us turning things around. We're obviously playing a lot better recently.

Our guys are swinging the bats real well, our staff has sort of rounded out and is in good health, and the bullpen has been throwing the ball well. Right now we're playing really, really well. But the big key has been our offense.

Our guys have been swinging the bats unbelievably. Through the tough times earlier this season, we felt like it was just a matter of time. We didn't panic. Back then, we kept looking at each other as if to say, "Surely we are going to play better. We just have too much talent."

We still looked at each other when we were playing bad, but thank goodness we finally straightened it out. When you have a team with a track record like ours -- most of these guys are .300 hitters -- you knew that sooner or later they were going to start swinging hot bats.

At the start of the season, we suffered a lot of injuries to our starting staff. It was crazy. For the first three or four weeks of the season I was pitching with four rookies and a couple of them are now in Double-A. We just had a bad run of health. We watched as one guy after the next went down with an injury.

Looking back, it's nice to know we hung in there. We could have pointed fingers but we persevered through it and now we're playing well again. Hopefully, we can keep this up.

We've played a lot better on the road the last six weeks or so and keeping that up is going to be big. Obviously, if you can go into another team's ballpark and win a series here and there, it will be huge for us because that's tough to do.

I don't pay any attention to the postseason possibilities at this point. The thing I concern myself with is whether we're playing well. I could care less if we win the division or get in as a Wild Card, as long as we make it to the playoffs. I know that is how I feel.

The fans, of course, would love to see us win our division and we would love to win our division. But the big thing is to get into the postseason.

Considering the way we started out -- I think we were nearly 15 games out of first place at one point -- being able to make the run we have recently is pretty special.

Hopefully, we keep playing well and get to the playoffs. We can then focus on where we really want to be -- in the World Series.

Andy Pettitte has won six games since the All-Star break and four straight. The Yankees have won 15 of their last 21 games and have gotten themselves back into the playoff picture.

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